Franco: Wrongful Death
by Tessaray
Summary: Dark, speculative one-shot about what may have happened when Franco went to New York to settle his lawsuits.


**FRANCO: WRONGFUL DEATH**

 **by Tessaray**

* * *

There's an intoxicating buzz of energy and promise in the New York City air that Franco has never been able to feel before. Scents slam into him — meats grilling in Halal carts, chestnuts roasting even in the summer swelter, rancid piss gasping from subway grates — and it all stirs and stings him with equal intensity. The tumor had made him a fucking zombie — a cold, calculating, homicidal zombie — and it's never been more clear to him than now, now that he's fully awake and able to absorb and react to _his city_ for the first time... like he's been reborn...

If he's honest (and he's tying to be) he's only in the city to get his money back. He resents the time away from Elizabeth, but his lawyers had assured him the glacial civil lawsuits were finally thawing, and it's like being sprung from limbo. Even if the settlements leave him with just a fraction of his former wealth, it's enough — no more shame, no more scraping by. And he can finally get the hell on with his life.

He leaves the negotiations to the pros, keeps his hands clean. They only call him into the towering law offices when they need a signature, and then he sits in a grand leather chair, pen in hand, while a paralegal flips through thick documents to the pages with green Post-it flags. He signs at the "x", initials there and there. The rest of the time he spends at large, wandering the city.

He walks for hours, for miles every day. Most of his old haunts are gone, others are best avoided... yet he feels a mounting excitement as time passes. They could build a life here — he, Elizabeth and the boys — get a place in Tribeca, and the two of them could start painting again in earnest. He's never lost his compulsion to create; he could reconnect with his gallery, or find one that would encourage a new direction, would understand that artists evolve...

And it's usually when he's lost in one of these reveries that he's recognized, in a nervous, narrow-eyed, hurry-on-past kind of way... and then he remembers, with a cold shock, that art is no longer what he's famous for...

 _Serial Killer..._

 _Psycho..._

 _Freak..._

#

He's roaming the streets of Bushwick late one night, looking for a vestige of the outsider art scene that once thrived in edgy pockets of the city, but seems to have vanished now. He's begun to worry that it's him... that maybe it's all around but he can't see it, doesn't know the secret handshake anymore, he's too old, too over...

"DUDE! Where ya been?!"

A hand claps his back and he instinctively stiffens, but stands his ground. It's a man about his age, balding, with the mummified look of a meth addict. He seems vaguely familiar... Franco feels he should know him, but the man doesn't seem to expect recognition.

"Lookin' for the pop-up?"

A pop-up art show. Perfect.

"I am," Franco says.

"Brownstone, half-a-block down, look for the "It's a Girl!" balloons. Garden level. Where's my tip?"

Franco fishes out his wallet, peels off a ten.

"Loved your work, man," the guy says, stuffing the bill down his pants. "The world needs you."

Franco nods his appreciation, mutters, "Like a hole in the head," and moves toward distant pink balloons swaying in the stale breeze.

The "gallery" is a basement that reminds Franco of the Wayne's World set... but for the crush of barely dressed, emaciated young bodies. A quick glance around tells him he's the oldest person there. He's gripped by the urge to leave, is about to obey when he hears his name... it's a hushed sound that floats and repeats through the space until one by one, every face has turned toward him... and the faces are uniformly awe-struck.

He nods, half-smiles. He'd been the center of attention for most of his adult life, so he reaches deep, finds and dusts off his old darkly ironic persona and presents it to the crowd to do with as they will. Still, he's amazed, flattered... it seems he's been gone so long he's become fashionable again. Either that or, judging by some hungry gazes openly sweeping his body, his infamy has made him perversely desirable.

He turns his attention to the art on the wall. Self-conscious of the eyes still on him, it's hard to focus at first... but gradually the images take shape. They're photographs of upturned faces, shot from above in intimate close-up, one after another after another... a variety of races, ages, genders... each caught in hideous mid-scream, mouths — with wet and wide, eyes bulging, straining desperately toward the viewer. The photos hit Franco like a punch in the gut, so familiar his mouth goes dry. He glances at the people around him to gauge their reactions — without exception, they simply glance at a piece and move on, giving no indication they understand what they're seeing. But Franco understands — these are moments of primal human terror, staged and captured for the sadistic pleasure of the artist.

"I can't fucking believe this — you're my idol, man! What an honor!" Franco turns to find a skinny kid at his elbow, no more than twenty, gaping at him. His appearance is striking — thick white hair streaked with red spilling over his shoulders, pale skin, red eyeliner, red eyeshadow, red lips...

"Your work?" Franco says.

"Yeah."

Franco swallows down nausea, is about to launch into a confrontation when the kid grabs him by the arm and pulls him into a corner. "I got other stuff," he whispers, takes out his cellphone, scrolls, then holds the screen up to Franco's face. It's a photo of a girl, clearly dead — bluish, bloated. She's been artfully posed on a riverbank and outlined in red spray paint, mimicking one of Franco's most celebrated works. Its date stamp is one week ago.

"An homage, maestro," the kid says, low and eager, leaning in close.

The room spins, narrows to a single point. Rage, horror and disgust all merge into one monster emotion and crash into Franco like a tidal wave. He slams the kid into the wall, forearm crushing the frail white throat. He'd never felt much when he killed — never felt anything at all but a relentless hunger he's since learned to label as _obsession —_ but this kid… this kid is smiling, turned on, begging for more... will probably go on to _do_ more, if he hasn't already. His eyes are wide and glittering, a string of spittle falls from his crimson lips onto Franco's sleeve. He's clearly stoned, fucked up on god-knows-what they're taking these days. Franco snarls, shoves hard and hears a satisfying smack as the kid's head hits the whitewashed brick behind him. He steps back then, glaring venom, wants to know everything and _nothing_ about that photo, about that girl, wants to set the kid straight, to save him, stop him... but he knows that if he tries to speak now he'll puke. Only then does he become aware of the cheers surrounding them, the applause, the phalanx of cellphones coming out to record the moment...

#

The next morning, Franco collapses onto the stoop of the house where the show had been. As is the nature of pop-ups, the place is empty as a crypt now — no wilted pink balloons, no hooks on the walls, not so much as a discarded vape.

He pushes his long hair from his face, cradles his pounding head. He shouldn't have stormed out last night... shouldn't have gotten staggering drunk at the bar around the corner and slept it off half-draped over some yuppie's wrought-iron fence. He should have taken that kid into a dark alley and beaten the shit out of him, put the fear of God into him, made him see that the man he idolizes is no master, no role-model — he's nothing but a murdering psycho freak who pretended that every violent, depraved act was an expression of artistic genius. And they let him get away with it. They _celebrated_ him for it.

Fuck that. He should have called the cops. That's what he should have done.

#

He's haunted, sickened after that, only leaves the hotel for meetings. And he goes to every damn one now: meetings with lawyers, meetings with accountants... especially meetings with the relatives of his victims — wives and husbands, parents and children. There's not enough evidence for a trial, not enough to convict, but enough for civil suits. _Wrongful Death_. They have that. And they have hate. Hate like knives that carve every ounce of flesh from his bones… and every day he goes back for more. He doesn't have to be there… the lawyers tell him repeatedly to stay the hell away unless he's called, and he tells them to go easy on the plaintiffs, agree to anything, it doesn't matter anymore. But the least he can do for those people — the very, very least — is to show up, give them a target... an outlet…

And then he returns to his room and watches TV, scans the news for missing persons or a skinny kid with red and white hair. He hits the gym until his muscles tremble. He has crappy take-out delivered to his room and eats it with plastic utensils as the lights of the city blink on one by one, then by the dozens, then the hundreds, gradually becoming a vast blanket of shimmering color. He'd never been able to feel the beauty of it before… wasn't capable of the visceral responses that made other people, _human_ people, gasp and stare in wonder. He could only appreciate beauty intellectually, if it met a narrow set of aesthetic criteria…

But now he sits by the window every night, marveling at all he's missed, sometimes squinting to make the lights dance... and then they merge in his mind with the screaming faces in those photos, and the lancing hatred in the eyes of his victims — because they're all his victims. And inevitably the scene before him blurs as tears come hard... and he grieves, rages, falls to his knees, rains blows onto his bowed head, into his gut... longing for salvation, desperate for the arms of Elizabeth, the miracle of her…

 _Elizabeth_. He'd promised to stay in touch, had meant to… but when things turned bad after the pop-up, he'd had to create distance between them... so video chats devolved into phone calls, devolved into texts. He can't carry his poisonous days into conversation with her, can't bear the softness in her voice. And as time passes, she fades until he can't believe that a life with her will ever be more real to him than the life of his black memories… or that she would ever want him if she _knew_ …

He could just give up the hopeless, exhausting struggle to be _good_. He considers it constantly — there's a place for him here. There's a place for everyone here. He could stay in this city and let his tumor-free self find its own level. True, it probably wouldn't be an admirable existence, but it wouldn't be shameful either, or criminal...

Or happy.

And that's the thing. He knows _happy_ now, has felt it... and she's waiting for him in Port Charles with soulful eyes and a tender touch. She believes in him, gives him hope... and though she deserves so much more than even the best man he could ever be... she seems to think he's enough. So what else can he do, but go where hope is, and continue the struggle... and maybe someday... _someday_...

#

"He comes highly recommended," the hotel concierge tells Franco. "Many clients consider him to be an artist. I can get you in..."

Franco is sick to death of so-called artists, but he takes the appointment... takes the chance that this small step might send a signal to his psyche that things have changed...

So he skips the masochistic scene at his lawyers' office that day, and instead goes to the posh salon to let the artist-stylist fuss and have his way... and with each snip, he imagines that the long hair falling softly to the floor is thick and white and streaked with red...

"You're a new man!" the stylist announces, turning Franco's chair with a flourish for the big reveal. He's never defined himself by his appearance, but the man looking back from the mirror is the man he wants to be now — neat, respectable... a man who would feel awkward at a gallery opening, who wouldn't know one end of a spray can from the other. This is a man who gives a shit what people think. Yeah, this man could be a father... and a husband to a woman he could almost have a prayer of deserving.

Franco sighs.

"I sure fucking hope so."

-end-


End file.
